Mojitos and murder mysteries at the Crisis Skylight Cafe

After an extremely busy week with the Shift event and despite the long weekend, and all my hopes of (finally) getting on top of my blogging, I’ve spent the last couple of days in bed and doped up on antibiotics. And with nothing that exciting to report today, I thought I’d tell you about last weekend..

In general though I think Sundays are one of those write-off days where usually I find myself wasting most of the day in bed, being lazy and preparing for the week ahead. So when I first heard about Culture Kitchen‘s Murder in Havana event last week, I thought it would make a much more interesting way of spending a Sunday and dragged Cata along for the ride. Organised by Culture Connect, the afternoon transported us into a hotel in Havana where we were tasked with solving the mystery of the murder of one of the hotel’s guests, while enjoying a Cuban-themed lunch. Having been greeted with mojitos at the door, we were quickly sat down and introduced to our team before the actors entered and the murder mystery began.. and the food was brought out, all of which we were tucking into whilst questioning suspects and trying to solve the murder! To begin with, we were served tachinos, twice fried green plantain chips served with sofrito and green leaf and tomato salad. For the main course, we had Cuban style minced beef that had been marinated for 24 hours in oregano, garlic, cumin and lime and cooked in tomato, onion and red pepper sauce with paprika, capers, raisins and olives; along with frijoles colorados, a spiced red kidney bean potage with aubergine and chorizo, accompanied with plain white rice. And for dessert we had bread and butter pudding topped with a freshly prepared pineapple jam.

There was a big mix of people there and it was great to learn a little bit more about what it is that Culture Connect do, and how they allow people in Newcastle to connect with others and to experience different cultures. Ran by Culture Connect, Culture Kitchen basically is the umbrella name for any activities the charity holds that involve food. I was lucky enough to be sat next to one of the charity’s volunteers, a young lady from Crete, who told me all about the cooking classes they hold.. I definitely want to try one out now after hearing about her experience learning about Sardinian cuisine! It’s the first time I’ve ever been to an event like this so I wasn’t really sure what to expect and don’t have anything to compare it to, but I’ll definitely be attending the next Culture Kitchen event, and keeping an eye on the classes they’re holding.

hi, Hannah. I'm Alex, the one who cooked at this event. I'd like to update my blog… I'll obviously be linking to this one but… have you got any pictures of the food (and may be me) I could use in my blog? Pretty please…

Hi Alex, thanks for getting in touch. Yeah of course you're fine to use them as long as they have a link back 🙂 I think I've just have the photos I used on this post I'm afraid… I may have a closer shot of the mince though! Will you send me an email so I've got your contact info. Mine is hannahlayford (at) btinternet.com